Belkin Announces Intent to Acquire Cisco's Home Networking Business Unit

Belkin, a private company based in Playa Vista, Calif., with operations and sales in more than 100 countries, today announced that it has entered into an agreement to acquire Cisco's Home Networking Business Unit, including its proven products, technology, well-known Linksys brand and talented employees. With global operations, Linksys' main office is located in Irvine, Calif.

"We're very excited about this announcement," said Chet Pipkin, CEO of Belkin. "Our two organizations share many core beliefs - we have similar beginnings and share a passion for meeting the real needs of our customers through the strengths of an entrepreneurial culture. Belkin's ultimate goal is to be the global leader in the connected home and wireless networking space and this acquisition is an important step to realizing that vision."

Belkin intends to maintain the Linksys brand and will offer support for Linksys products as part of this transaction. All valid warranties will be honored by Belkin for current and future Linksys products. After the transaction closes, Belkin will account for approximately 30 percent of the U.S. retail home and small business networking market.

"Linksys pioneered wireless connectivity capability around the globe, and has a strong brand renowned for its premium market position, the strength of its installed base and its proven dependability. Linksys users benefit from peace of mind in their home networking environment. At Belkin we have developed great insight into consumer needs, and the experiences, solutions and products we bring to the market, including our WeMo home automation platform, will help us to grow Linksys' market presence," Pipkin said.

"Linksys is one of the leading home networking providers and has created a market-leading suite of products and services to meet customer needs," said Hilton Romanski, VP Corporate Business Development, Cisco. "While part of Cisco, Linksys has continuously innovated, while strengthening the brand and expanding its market leadership. As part of Cisco's commitment to service providers, we are pleased about this strategic relationship with Belkin to build on Linksys' position of strength."

"With complementary innovation and engineering strategies in the combined organization, Belkin will be able to create new opportunities for consumers, distribution partners and resellers, and will have the strongest retail presence in the U.S. networking marketplace. Belkin also will have access to a large installed base that will be able to upgrade their networking environment to take advantage of new technologies in the smartphone, tablet, notebook and home automation arenas," Pipkin said. "Additionally, Linksys will enhance Belkin's capabilities to meet the needs of the service provider space and small business users."

Belkin and Cisco intend to develop a strategic relationship on a variety of initiatives including retail distribution, strategic marketing and products for the service provider market. Having access to Cisco's specialized software solutions across all of Belkin's product lines will bring a more seamless user experience for customers. Merging the innovation capabilities of Linksys and Belkin provides a powerful platform from which to develop the next generation of home networking technology.

"At Belkin, we're committed to enabling great experiences for users of today's mobile and connected home technologies," Pipkin said. "The acquisition of Linksys and the combination of Belkin's and Linksys' expertise and innovation will position us to meet the demands of today's rapidly evolving advances in technology. We look forward to honoring the heritage of the Linksys brand and investing in the continuing evolution of its product portfolio. Together, we will provide a powerful, simple to use, and reliable wireless and networking platform for the markets we serve."

Specific financial terms of the transaction are undisclosed. The transaction is subject to various standard closing conditions and is expected to close in March 2013.

I don't see how it is going to be possible. Linksys products were terrible at best and service is one the worst I have encountered so far. I hope this takeover improves the quality of service for Linksys products.

I swear by my WRT54GL with Tomato firmware. It would be better if Asus acquired them, because in my only experience with an Asus router (the one that can run Tomato) it was so terrible/broken it had to be returned to the store and replaced with a proper WRT54GL.
As for Belkin, in my book, it has the image of a overpriced producer of cheap cables and peripherals.

p.s. I know that the WRT54GL was the last router produce by the original Linksys company before the Cisco acquisition, but is was hopping of a revamp in Cisco's custody or someone that at least has some tangency with the router business.

Linksys hardware wasn't that bad, it was the firmware that was absolute shit(and most of that can be blamed on Cisco dumbing the firmware down so as not to compete with their low-end corporate products).

Every linksys product I've run with a custom 3rd party firmware has been fantastic(My E3000 running tomato is the best router I've ever used). Every one I've run with the stock firmware has been a headache.

The best thing Belkin could possible do is acquire the hardware, keep producing that, but put DD-WRT on every router they ship instead of the shit firmware Cisco uses.

Agreed. Belkin's devices are fundamentally flawed for a number of reasons, number one being unable to maintain a live connection after your PC generates only a few thousands of UDP packets (think DHT from torrents). If a router cannot sustain something even as mundane as this, it's not worthy to be released onto the market.

Belkin is the WORST company to be paired up with. Linksys has been going down the drain lately, and this take-over will put the last nail in their coffin.

Yea i agree with others Belkin are crap over here in AUS also, modem, routers, whatever it is (besides there cables) i found are crap, over priced and just terrible to work with (long range my ass) Cisco here has had a good name for its self so yes this is not a good thing for Cisco.

Personally i use Billion modem routers and or TP-Link/netgear havent had any issues with these brands.

Linksys hardware wasn't that bad, it was the firmware that was absolute shit(and most of that can be blamed on Cisco dumbing the firmware down so as not to compete with their low-end corporate products).

Every linksys product I've run with a custom 3rd party firmware has been fantastic(My E3000 running tomato is the best router I've ever used). Every one I've run with the stock firmware has been a headache.
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I completely agree with this 100%. It was always amazing that certain versions of older Linksys firmware worked WAY better than the newer versions. Some of them were rock solid. I ran 1.44.2 on a BEFSR41 (Version 1) for years (7?) until my roommate's dog killed it by pissing on it, but that's another story.

Absolute silence without compromising performance is my only benchmark score.

Had WRT54GL and it was an epic router with Tomato firmware. Today, i have the E4200 and it's yet again amazing with TomatoRAF firmware. Never really liked Belkin. They make good power surge protections but i have very little confidence in their routers...

Right now I use an 8-port ethernet router (Linksys) with a Motorola SurfBoard SB6141 DOCSIS 3.0 ethernet Cable Modem. What is out there that will allow me to add on a wireless router capabilitiy in addition to my system, that works good?
So far with what I have, I have no complaints, it works great. I just want to add wireless too.
At any given time I have 3 pcs running and sometimes a Sony Playstation 3. However when family drops by I'd like them to be able to use their laptops via wireless here.

I was looking at a Linksys EA6500 Smart Wi-Fi Dual-Band AC Router with Gigabit and 2x USB to add to the system.
Would this work?
I dunno...I am reading some piss poor reviews on that router? Any input?
Or would I be better off just dumping my 8-port ethernet router and going straight to wireless with something like a ASUS RT-N66U Dual-Band Wireless-N900 Gigabit Router, DD-WRT Open Source support, IEEE 802.11a/b/g/n, IEEE 802.3/3u/3ab?

I don't see how it is going to be possible. Linksys products were terrible at best and service is one the worst I have encountered so far. I hope this takeover improves the quality of service for Linksys products.

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I've had 3 Linksys routers, one after Cisco got ahold of it and I've been happy with all of them and they've all lasted a long life and have supported DD-WRT except for one which got many years of use out of it before it went kaput (I got it second hand anyways).

I have no experience with them as of late, but most people say Cisco did that already.

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My E4200 has been working great, I haven't had to give it a second thought since I bought it. The only thing that doesn't work right is router config through HTTPS which I don't need anyways because it's not like I'm opening it to external traffic, so thats a non-issue for me.

Every linksys product I've run with a custom 3rd party firmware has been fantastic(My E3000 running tomato is the best router I've ever used). Every one I've run with the stock firmware has been a headache.

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The stock firmware doesn't bother me too much. It is dumbed down a bit but not enough to prevent me from doing anything I need to do with it. If 5ghz wasn't a little finicky on DD-WRT I would be more apt to consider it but I don't need it per say.

That's my experience, but we must wrong since everyone else who doesn't seem to claim to have a Linksys/Cisco router says they're bad. It's really pretty sad this is the kind of reception Linksys gets now because the E4200 is the best router I've used thus far. Heck, I got a new Linksys/Cisco router for my parents for Christmas to replace their aging WRT54G and their downstream increased by 10Mbit just by swapping out the routers. They haven't had a single issue with it and neither of us have have had to intervene since it was first plugged in. I don't call that bad service.

I wish I could kill myself instead of using windows (OSX can suck it too).

People need to know the difference between junk software and junk hardware. Stock firmware on nearly all routers is GARBAGE. Some are definitely much worse than others (like the old linksys and any 2wire crap - both great for crashing).

The hardware is solid on the cisco/linksys stuff as others have stated. I run the shit out of mine. Hell, I buy TP-link, etc, for cheap dd-wrt/tomato routers. I pretty much exclusively use these two brands for myself and others with no issue.